Debate gets too personal
It is not polite to insult someone on Twitter. Actually, insulting someone is not polite, full stop.
Easier said than done, in the stormy world of politics. Politicians live on arguments. So it is not surprising if the debate sometimes gets too personal. Criticising a person's ideas is only a short step away from criticising that person.
On Tuesday, Liberal MP Michelle Simson took out some of her frustration over Conservative Dean Del Mastro. The problem is that she did so on the internet, during the session. "Del Mastro should grow up (not out)," she tweeted.
Del Mastro stood up in the House and responded heatedly. He was sorry he was not "perfect". Maybe he did not meet certain people's "criteria", but he had been battling overweight since birth.
Simson apologised for being rude.
According to Politwitter, among Canadian politicians on Twitter last month, 25 MPs were Tories. There were 24 Liberals, 17 New Democrats and two Bloc Quebecois.
Exercises
| 1) | What do you know about the Canadian parliament? Find out more! Then present the information to your class. There are many aspects to the use of Twitter in politics. MP Jack Layton of Toronto feels it is "difficult to reduce complex issues to 140 characters." MP Mark Holland thinks Twitter promotes "info-dumping", since it lends itself "to a lot of really useless information." While MP Libby Davies of Vancouver thinks Twitter is fun and cheeky. Getting "little snippets of what's going on" makes people feel "that they are in the loop", especially in remote areas of the country. | |
| 2) | Work in groups to think of more arguments for and against Twitter in Canadian politics. Then stage a debate on the issue. | |
| 3) | a. | Twitterise today's text: work in groups to try to reduce the content of the article to 140 characters. |
| b. | Compare your tweets. What information remains, and what gets lost? Motivate your choices! | |
| 4) | What effects may Twitter have on society? Is it worse when insults are written or when they are spoken? Write a short text with your ideas! |
